On 12 January, English shoegaze and indie rock band Slowdive released their first track in 22 years, since their third album (1995). As they revealed to Pitchfork, Neil Halstead, Christian Savill, Nick Chaplin, Rachel Goswell, and Simon Scott began working on their fourth album during their 2014 reunion tour:
“When the band decided to get back together in 2014, we really wanted to make new music. It's taken us a whole load of shows and a few false starts to get to that point, but it's with pride and a certain trepidation we unleash ‘Star Roving.’ It’s part of a bunch of new tracks we've been working on and it feels as fun, and as relevant playing together now as it did when we first started. We hope folks enjoy it.”
Neil Halstead, Pitchfork
Writing in 1991, New York Times music journalist Simon Reynolds observed the growing popularity of the shoegaze/dreampop genre during the immediate years that followed the end of Thatcher's reign over Britain and described its hallmarks: "Dream pop combines nebulous, distorted guitars with murmured vocals sometimes completely smudged into a wall of noise [...] Lyrically, dream pop celebrates rapturous and transcendent experiences, often using druggy and mystical imagery. A common theme is the desire to rise above the drab confines of everyday life, by going nowhere fast".
Reynolds observed that Slowdive stood apart from political and social commentary, opting "to create something big and beautiful and sort of timeless". Two decades later, this commitment to art for art's sake still rings true: "Star Roving" is track painted on a sweeping canvas, maximalist in its sonicscape (with multiple layers of reverb-drenched guitars and pulsing drum beats) and minimalist in its lyricism (Halstead and Goswell contribute atmospheric, whispery vocals that are hard to decipher - along with pleasant cooing during the track's transition sequences):
Lyrics: Genius
It appears that no trepidation was necessary - the track's celestial escape into the comforts and complexities of private intimacy are reassuring and timely in the context of contemporary political and economic anxiety.
